Books to Read and Bookish Gifts to Buy

First, a recommendation: an art hoax to end all art hoaxes. In the 1960s, the journalist and novelist Clifford Irving became friendly with a gentleman named Elmyr de Hory while living in Ibiza, Spain. In 1967, his pal Elmyr disclosed to Irving that for decades he had been forging famous painters; not copies of existing work but originals “in the style of”: a fake study for a legitimate Picasso bronze, a new portrait of a young girl who Modigliani really had painted several times. The jig was up, he said, the authorities were circling. “A writer usually hunts for his… Read Full Article